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Making My House A Home

I’m about to sign a two-year lease on my apartment, finally admitting to myself that I’m here for good and no longer a roaming bohemian. It only took me four years, I feel very proud. :/ Anyway, my apartment still feels very apartmenty because I haven’t decorated — due to my thinking that I might vacate at any second! — and I’d like to change that. I can’t paint, which would be my first choice. I can drape fabric around, but I can’t afford to do so right now.

Side Rant: how is it every year I swear I’m not doing this Christmas overspending crap and then somehow I do? Stupid cookies.

Side Rant Correction: I didn’t actually spend that much on gifts as I didn’t have that much to spend, but I did overspend on lunch at work, a problem I’m still working on.

Anyway! The thing I’ve always done when wanting to make my house feel more like a home is put up art. When I left Texas in 2005 I left behind a LOT of art, so I hope to have enough money in January to get that shipped to me. That won’t be enough for the whole apartment, though. So here’s my wish for 2010:

I would like to cover my walls in awesome postcards and inexpensive, medium-sized art prints. I’m going to need help with the postcard bit, though! If you happen to have a cool postcard lying around with some beautiful art or funny message or something else awesome, and you don’t plan to put it on your wall, will you send it to me? And if you come across one at a museum or cafe or something between now and mid-February, please send me those, too! Make postcards of your own art or projects or events? Send ’em! Funny notes on the back are encouraged.

The address to send is below. This P.O. Box only lasts until February, so send everything ya got before the 15th.

K. Bradford
P.O. Box 66
New York, NY 10018-9998

When all of the cards are in, I’ll take a picture of the result.

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FWIW, in addition to postcards, one of my best sources of cheap art has been deaccessioned library books. You know, they mark DISCARD on the inside, some toddler tore out a couple of pages, so it’s okay that you are destroying a book to get at the one illustration you love. Then I go to Kohl’s and buy a cheap frame (and sometimes sand or paint the frame) and Bob is my uncle.

(I have 7 classic comic book covers as framed art on my walls, too: I cut up a book of high-quality cover repros.)

Meanwhile, off the walls, desktop business-card holders are a very simple “mini-easel” to hold a sheaf of postcards. Flip the front one to the back of the stack every once in a while and you have a rotating display!

The ones I have are from Rolodex; do a Google image search on ROL82409 to see examples.

Past year’s calendars have great artwork in them and can be found online for next to nothing or even free from friends and family.

Congrats on your lease and in making your space a home.

I'm a speculative fiction writer by night, a media critic and culture columnist by day, and an activist blogger in the interstices. I enjoy science fiction, fantasy, short stories, harshing your squee about that thing you love, and squeeing hard about that thing I love, in that order.